Vegan &/or Raw

Cacao sounds like a verb. Something you do to someone when they tamper with your temper.

Ka-Kow! It also sounds like a magical spell, which is exactly what cacao does to porridge.

Cacao butter is going to take your porridge to a whole new level – that’s why we call this recipe The Elevator.

Curiously, cacao butter is creamy and pale. If you close your eyes and smell it, you’d never guess it wasn’t chocolate. You see, cacao butter is responsible for All Things Chocolatey. That’s right. This ingredient owns you.

Like all butters, cacao fat is damn delicious and leaves your palate purring for more. But a little goes a long way. We now know that moderate amounts of good fats form an integral part of our health – avocados, unsalted nuts, olive oil, egg yolks. Cheap, bastardised fats in convenience products and confectionery, will often brutalize your waistline and your arteries.

Find the unadulterated raw form of cacao butter in health shops and Supervalu stores nationwide. It’s not housed in the refrigerated area – look instead for the superfood shelf made for savvy shoppers like you.

White chocolate porridge

Serves 1

1 tablespoons raw cacao butter, roughly shaved

120ml (1/2 cup) preferred form of milk

4 tablespoons oat flakes

Pinch of flaky sea salt

Pistachios and raw honey, to serve

I bet you have a particular way of cooking porridge, attentive to your own neuroses. Me too! This recipe will work, whichever way you choose to cook it.

For everyone else, I recommend bringing the cacao butter and your preferred milk to a gentle heat, below simmering point. Then add the oats, the flaky salt and cook for 5 minutes until the oats expand. Try not to let the pot boil, burning the taste of the milk.

Serve with great big globs of whipped or set honey and a cup of Early Grey.

Cutlery numbs my taste buds. I’m convinced my fingertips start to recognise flavour before any of it reaches my mouth. Eggs and guacamole on toast? My digits get to taste it first. Imagine the same breakfast with a knife and fork? Or eating a hamburger with cutlery? Sushi perhaps? Even pizza?

Look, if I’m to be perfectly honest, I think we can taste words too. Often reading a restaurant menu is the best part of the meal. Each word is like a little comet of deliciousness.

I don’t think any of this constitutes as news, except that I rarely spot people using their fingers with the same giddy determination and shamanistic frenzy I apply to my meals. Clearly, more people bow to the sophistication of a fork – a majesty which I think is comically misplaced. There are some intriguing results out there, led by scientists, to suggest other homo sapiens behave like me. Phew. (Although it’s possible these studies were led by historians rather than gastro physicists. Nevermind).

This week’s recipe is a playful experiment for your taste buddies. Let’s munch half the batch with our fingers. And then chew the rest of the sesame snaps using a fork. Ask your taste buds to vote.

Sesame seeds morph into extraordinary little explosions of flavour in the oven. We love them for their sweet nutty smack, but also for their plant-based calcium which makes them great for growing nippers. In Hinduism, sesame is referred to as the seed of immortality. This is probably because of its pumped portfolio of plant lignans and other crazy cool protective compounds like phytooestrogens.

These sesame snaps make me feel like I’m going to live forever. And if I don’t? I’m happy to die trying.

Sesame Snaps

5 tablespoons sesame seeds

1 tablespoon rice malt syrup or maple syrup

Pinch of sea salt

Preheat your oven to 220C.

In a cup, mash the ingredients together with a fork. Spread the mixture over a baking tray lined with non-stick parchment as best as you can. It’s outrageously sticky, but don’t worry. The heat will help the mixture collapse.

Bake at 200-220C for 5 mins, until bubbly. You want the water to evaporate from the mixture which will give it its crunch.

Allow to solidify once cooled. Smash.

Taking the hell out of healthy.

Hit “BOOM” at the top left corner with your email address my friend, to receive new monthly recipes direct to your inbox. Free of charge. Namaste!

For security purposes, I like to keep a jar of liquorice granola in my cupboard at all times. I’m a better human being when my belly is busy.

The older I get, the more I need my food to fill an emotional crypt too. I get a better burn from lovingly crafted granola than the store-bought stuff. I get a theatrical high knowing my corner café hand-roasts their coffee beans to Shostakovich. Or that my breakfast eggs are served with a wave from the chef. It’s the love and adoration bestowed upon ingredients that really grips me, and makes me want to purr like a homeless kitten at a stranger’s leg.

Food is more than substance. It’s more than fuel. There’s no love in highly processed food – it’s just conveyor belt crap and cannot service you physically or emotionally. Not the way this granola can.

As promised to so many readers, I finally found a worthy way of re-purposing nutpulp, left over from making your very own mylk (inspired by Jodi here). Namaste.

Nut pulp Granola with Liquorice & Cinnamon

Serves 12-16

1/2 cup (125ml) virgin coconut oil

1/2 cup (125ml) good honey or rice malt

1 teaspoon flaky sea salt (sounds a lot, but it reaches 16 portions)

2 cups (300g) nut pulp, left over from making nut milk (or use ground almonds)

1 Fire up your oven to 160 C. Line your largest tray, or 2 smaller ones, with parchment paper.

2 In a big saucepan, gently melt your coconut oil, the honey and decent smattering of salt. You want them to smooch each other, not violently grumble. Parachute the remaining ingredients into the pan, turn off the heat, and thoroughly coat.

3 Spoon onto your prepared tray and bake for 30 minutes. This recipe requires longer cooking time than regular granola, because the wet nut pulp needs to dry in the oven. If it’s not dry, it won’t store well. Don’t be tempted to crank up the heat – this will only burn the oats.

5 Remove from the oven once cooked. Clouds of warm-scented liquorice and honey will waft through your house, reminding you (and the apartment block) of your culinary wizardry.

Can be stored for up to 3 weeks in a tightly sealed jar, sprinkled over despondent salads or languorous mornings. I added some sprouted buckwheat and cacao nibs a week later, to change it up a little (see photo).

Taking the hell out of healthy.

Hit “BOOM” at the top left corner with your email address my friend, to receive new monthly recipes direct to your inbox. Free of charge. Namaste!